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Topiara - Chapter 53
Jilan sat to the side of the evening firebowl, listening to the other Tellings wash over and around him and not hearing a word of what was being said. His mind was down a level, with Lyara.
Yiren refused to speak to him now. She'd escorted him to the Feast, and then done her duty introducing him to the Ru'an and the rest of her remaining family as half of the pair that had performed the sha'adrah – and then pointedly moved away from him and didn't speak to him again. Her censure stung – she knew as well as he did the way Lyara had been behaving lately, surely she would sympathize if she'd just let him explain… But she didn't want to hear him.
Then again, he hadn't wanted to hear Lyara either. Perhaps it was a little dose of his own medicine to know what it felt like to think oneself justified in a form of behavior and want to explain, only to have the person for whom the explanation was most necessary not want to hear a word he said. If he felt that Yiren was doing was unfair, then how did he think Lyara felt about what he'd done. He'd not only refused to hear her, but he'd deliberately attempted to cut her out of his heart. He'd thrown her medicines at her and walked away.
He looked around him. The faces of the people circling the firebowl were all intent on the story being told. They wouldn't miss him. He stood into a half-crouch and with very careful steps, made his way through the throng until he was nearly to the door and the ladder to the level below. A hand on his arm stopped him, and he turned to face a very old and wizened man.
"Where is your i'ilim, sha'adrahni?" the ancient asked him with a look of concern. "Yiren tells that she was injured – does she rest below?"
Jilan nodded. "The healer at Chi'uchi said that the fa'un and the ipsi'il from the dart were…"
The old man's mouth dropped open. "Your i'ilim was shot with an ipsi'il dart?" When Jilan nodded, the old man grabbed his arm. "And she was able to travel here? What medicines did the Chi'uchi healer give her?"
"An ointment for the dart wound and where the fa'un was, and then kulu weed to…"
"May the vri'i of the zumi…" The old man's grip on Jilan's arm became tighter. "We must get to your i'ilim – immediately! I've seen too many lost to the interaction between ipsi'il and kulu weed… Most experienced healers know not to recommend or give out kulu when ipsi'il is involved – although those who come to their calling without being trained sometimes make that mistake..."
"What?!" Jilan stared.
"Together, ipsi'il and kulu weed make a toxic mix that not only relieves some pain, but can cause hallucinations – bad ones – and sometimes urges to self-destruction." The old man began to move. "Where is she – your i'ilim?"
Jilan darted past him and toward the ladder and was down and moving through the dividers of the level quickly as he headed for the far northern corner. He heard the old man call out before following him down the ladder, and soon there was the dim glow behind him of a small lamp. His heart had filled with fear and guilt and his stomach knotted painfully. Lyara's mood had had an outside cause he hadn't known, and he'd rejected her very cruelly. Yiren was right to wonder what kind of i'ilim he was, not to have wondered at the drastic mood change that had come over her after Chi'uchi. He'd been too busy enjoying life with Yiren to pay attention to the damage being done the woman he loved.
"Lyara?" he called as he moved through the doorway into the far chamber and then stared at the empty sleeping net. A very soft sound called his attention to the floor in the corner of the room nearest the outside wall, where Lyara sat with her injured leg outstretched and her arms reaching for the top of the protective weaving that formed the wall. "Lyara!"
"Let me be," she batted at his hands as he reached for her. "Let me die…"
"Here!" he called out in a desperate voice to the old man. He moved quickly past her hands and picked her up in his arms to carry her back to her sleeping net. "Lya… It's me, Jilan."
"Let me near, boy!" The old man pushed Jilan roughly out of the way. "Bring the lamp here!" He waited until there was the light, bright enough to cause Lyara to blink, and then pulled back and eyelid and tsked in disgust. "You, boy, take the lamp," he ordered Jilan. "Ka'arl, bring my pouch – and quickly too."
The man holding the lamp relinquished it into Jilan's keeping and took off across the room at a sprint. "Are you a healer?" Jilan asked hesitantly.
"I am La'un," the old man replied almost absently, "and your i'ilim is dangerously ill. You found her there?" A skeletal hand pointed, and Jilan nodded. "She would have jumped – many who suffer as she does do jump. If we cannot control the toxin, she may still die."
Jilan winced and felt the knot in his stomach grow tighter. "Is there a chance she can recover, though?"
"With the right treatment, perhaps, although it may take a while," La'un nodded and bent over the young woman's net. "Sha'adrahni, your i'ilim is here…"
"I have no i'ilim," Lyara whispered inconsolably. "I have no one."
"I'm here, Lya," Jilan insisted, moving to the opposite side of the net and capturing one of her hands in his. "I'm so sorry."
"Show me this ointment she was given," La'un demanded.
"In her bag, I think," Jilan replied.
The ancient healer bent to retrieve the bag and rifled through it, pulling the folded and tied packet from the very bottom and opening it so he could sniff it. "At least this is effective for soothing the wounds themselves," he pronounced and proceeded to apply a very liberal layer of the ointment to both Lyara's throat and leg.
Jilan hung onto her hand with all his strength and watched as the healing ointment once more took some of the extreme pain away. Lyara's eyes opened and she looked at him with a clarity of vision that he suddenly realized had been missing for days – and then she looked away and closed her eyes again with a soft sigh while trying to pull her hand out of his.
"Lya, please," he begged. "I was wrong – the healer here told me that you were given a wrong medicine that affected your mind. I should never have said the things I did…"
"Let me go," she whispered. "I release you from your bond…"
"No," he whispered back and put his forehead against hers. "I don't want to be released. You ARE my i'ilim – the only one I ever want."
"Here." La'un pushed at Jilan to move him out of the way and addressed himself brusquely to Lyara. "Put this in your mouth and suck on it," the old man directed, inserting a small wedge of bark between her lips. "Don't chew it or swallow it – just suck on it."
Lyara made a face, and Jilan knew that the taste of the bark wedge had to be at least as bitter and unpleasant as the kulu weed had been. Within minutes, however, her eyes started to droop and finally closed as if she had no further strength to hold them open. "Lya!" Jilan exclaimed in alarm and reached out to her.
"She only sleeps," Lu'an soothed him, working his fingers between her lips and pulling out the wedge of bark. "For now, this is a good thing. She needs time for the mixture that includes the kulu to work its way out of her body – and she will need constant care should she awaken again to make sure she doesn't try to destroy herself again."
"How long will she be at risk?" Jilan asked, knowing that there was no way that he wouldn't be in the sleeping net with her the moment they were alone, and no way that he'd leave her side again.
"How long has she been consuming kulu weed?" Lu'an asked.
"Almost three days."
The ancient's face sagged into a frown. "She will need supervision at least one whole day and perhaps into the next night."
"She'll have it," Jilan declared.
Lu'an dug around in his bundle of pouches and packets, then pulled a small, empty pouch and put several more wedges of bark into it. "When she awakens, let her drink a little liquid and eat a fruit or two – if she'll cooperate – and then have her suck on the bark again. I will return later today, to see how she is progressing."
"Thank you!" Jilan crossed his arms and bowed deeply to the old man. "You saved her life, and I am grateful."
"You saved the life of my little grand-niece and brought her home to us," Lu'an declared in response. "This way, we find balance." He bowed back and then bundled up his pack of herbs and ointments and followed the man carrying the lamp back toward the ladder to a lower level.
Jilan carefully slipped into the sleeping net with Lyara and pulled her limp and slightly feverish form into his arms. He could hear Rodayn whispering in the back of his mind, and he knew he would have much work ahead of him to repair his relationship with the little Kauwlut Guide who had become the very center of his world. He could only pray to all the gods he knew – and even to some that he didn't – that he could find a way to make amends.
Jilan had witnessed Lyara's fever dreams before – but never when HE played a major role in them as a torturer or unwilling rescuer. Except for the few times when he needed to see to his personal comfort and replenish the basket of fruit and container of water that La'un had ordered put at his disposal, he didn't move from Lyara's side. He cradled her tenderly when she lay still as if she were dead, and his arms gently contained her struggles amid cries of abandonment and distress. Several times she begged him to let her climb the wall and throw herself to the floor of the world, telling him in broken Talandri and occasional Kauwlut as well as Vri'ia'ani that all was lost and that she'd failed. At those times, Jilan's tears were no less bitter than Lyara's, even as he tried to soothe and placate her and waited for the wedge of bark in her mouth to once more work its magic.
The healer returned the next afternoon, as he'd promised, and merely nodded encouragement to the young man cradling his patient. "She is strong, your i'ilim – but she has lost much to the poison already. If she will not eat, then drizzle the juice into her mouth – or add it to the water she drinks," La'un advised. "She needs strength to fight off the poison, and she needs nourishment to build strength." Jilan immediately began adding fruit juice to the water container near the sleeping net for the next time she awakened.
Yiren stopped by to visit not long after the healer left; and although Jilan could see that her frustration and disgust with him had eased, the friendliness he'd relied upon during those last few days of travel had faded as well. It was as if he'd failed in some test of character in her eyes – and no amount of attendance to Lyara's needs now could balance the betrayal before. In many ways, he agreed with that assessment. After all the weeks and months of working to build Lyara's trust in him to a point that she'd give him her heart, he'd tossed it back at her cruelly when she was most in need of his love and help.
Two long days crept by, night passing into day and back into night almost without notice. Jilan's time was measured by the length of Lyara's deep sleeps and her restless periods of wakefulness. The second evening, she knew he was there – that he was caring for her – but how much of the many apologies he'd whispered into her ear she'd heard or understood was a mystery. By the middle of the afternoon of the third day, she was no longer begging to be allowed to die – but her waking moments were marked by a dullness and lethargy that was frightening. Even La'un was concerned when he visited that evening when Lyara was awake and unresponsive.
"You will have to give her something to live for now," was La'un's advice. "I heard her cry the first night – she believes she's lost everything, including you. You are the only one who can convince her otherwise." The ancient's face was grave. "She is at her most vulnerable now – the poison is almost gone, but so is her will to live." The old man patted Jilan's shoulder. "I have no advice for you, sha'adrahni. You know her heart better than I." He shuffled away toward the access ladder quietly.
Jilan turned and looked Lyara's face and saw that she was watching him with dark eyes that had no fire of life behind them at all. "Would you like some more water and juice?" he asked gently, smoothing her hair back from her face as he had hundreds and thousands of times over the last few days.
Silently she shook her head.
"You need to drink the juice – it will give you strength," he insisted gently. "You want to get better, don't you?"
"What for?" Her voice was rough and hoarse.
"We have a quest to finish yet," Jilan reminded her pointedly. "I can't do it without you."
"You said…"
"I know what I said," he told her in a soft and guilty voice. "And I was wrong to say it. I wish I could take those words back and throw them to the floor of the world unsaid. We're not finished, Lya…" he crooned, a tear coursing down one cheek as he caressed her face gently. "I spoke in frustration and anger – but you know I can't live without you. You are my i'ilim – my heart's mate. I love you."
"You should have let me die," Lyara told him in a hoarse whisper. "I'm never going to be as sparkling and witty as Yiren. I'm never going to be anything than what I am – and what I am stifles you." She didn't realize how weak she was until she raised her hand to cup Jilan's cheek. "She will make you happy. Go – let her make you happy…"
Jilan shook his head with growing vehemence. "She wouldn't have me – and I don't blame her. She knows my heart is yours and will never belong to any other. She barely even speaks to me any longer because of the way things were between you and me just before you fell so very ill." He caught at her hand before the strength that had brought it up failed utterly. "Stay with me, Lya. Drink the juice, get your strength back, and then come with me to the mountain of fire and ice the way Nilyaron wanted you to."
"I would not saddle you with one such as Dinia…"
Jilan made a rude sound. "I know now that was the fever and the poison speaking – not you. If I'd been thinking clearly, I would have realized how out of character you were becoming. You aren't like that…" At her look of tired skepticism, he insisted firmly, "You AREN'T. Ask Farranby. Ask Sharin. They know you, and you know they wouldn't have put up with a Dinia in our midst all this time."
Lyara's brow wrinkled. "What poison?"
Jilan settled back into the net and pulled her into his arms so that her head rested on his shoulder. "The healer back in Chu'ichi made a mistake. The substance in the dart that went into your leg mixed with the kulu weed she prescribed for you to drink – and the two are lethal. The healer here said you almost died – even without throwing yourself to the floor of the world."
"I'm tired," Lyara sighed, wishing she dared allow herself to get comfortable on his shoulder and in his arms once more. His words had begun to slide together into an almost incomprehensible sea of sound, and she had neither the energy nor the will to try to decipher it.
"Drink a little more juice first – then you can sleep," Jilan urged again and reached over the edge of the net to the floor where the cup, already filled, was waiting. "Please, Lya… Drink it for me."
Very reluctantly she allowed him to put the cup to her lips, and she swallowed half of the contents eventually before bringing up a hand and pushing it away. "Enough."
Jilan shifted so he could put the cup back on the floor, and then settled with her cradled in his arms. "Sleep, then. You'll feel better when you wake up next time." His lips brushed her forehead. "I love you so much. I'll be right here when you awaken next."
Lyara sighed, wishing she could believe him. Topiara tried to whisper soothingly to her, but she turned her attention away from her power stone. Both of them had betrayed her – Jilan and Topiara. And without them…
A tear rolled down her cheek without permission. Under Jilan's attentive care, she would no doubt recover her health in time. But there was now a hole in her soul – her vri'i – where her heart used to be; an empty and cold place marked where trust used to reside. That wound would take much longer to heal, if it ever did.
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